3 Ways to Make Onboarding Easier

The search for a new software product is hard enough. I get it, I’ve been through it and I’ve helped people through it. Here at Axosoft I am a part of our Sales team so I help people go through this process every day. I have also worked in software support, training and account management in the past so I completely understand the challenges of how to best set a team up for success.

Once you find the product that you think is the answer to all your problems, you have to convince your team it was the right choice. So how do you enlighten those folks and get them on board with the super new product you spent countless hours evaluating, reviewing, testing, asking questions about and negotiating for?

Recently, I had a customer who had a great attitude toward this process and wanted to focus our call on these best practices to be sure his team was successful with the Axosoft product. I think a lot of people could benefit from this advice, so I’m going to share my insights! There is no magic wand you can wave to get everyone on the same page, but here are a few things you can do to at least make it easier.

1. Prepare in Advance

Really think through what each of the new users (or teams of users) need to do on a daily basis. Ideally, you will have included representatives from these teams in the evaluation process to provide feedback, but if not, do your best and ask questions. Think about what they do when they come in and how this new product will make that easier for them. Once you figure that out, set up their access accordingly. What does that mean? It means don’t give them access to every little thing the software has to offer, but don’t limit them so much that they can’t actually get anything done.

If you are not sure what a specific role would need, ask someone to be a part of the process. Maybe this is a good chance to pull in someone you think would be a good resource or advocate. Ask him/her to take a stab at setting it up and test it out.

Axosoft Onboarding Tip: Set up your security roles to meet the needs of your user base. Be sure to think through their daily routine and give them enough access to be successful.

2. Make it Easy

It’s a good idea, where possible, to set up default views that will make things easier for the new user. Save settings that help even their first log in to make sense (as much as a brand new tool can).

You may also need to update terminology, naming conventions, etc. to match what the user is currently used to. If you use post-it notes on a whiteboard, set up your Axosoft cards and color code them in the same way to make things more familiar. It’s not identical, but it’s going to provide some level of comfort to that new user.

Axosoft Onboarding Tip: Check out the new supertabs and set up some shared ones that new users can take advantage of. Also, consider setting some new user defaults when creating user accounts.

3. Set Reasonable Goals

Ideally your new software product is the answer to many of the problems you were looking to solve – but you don’t need to solve them all on day one. What are the critical outcomes of switching to the new product you selected? What are the things that have to be done no matter what? Those are the things you want to train your new users on first. Trying to teach everyone how to tackle every part of a new software solution upfront is probably not going to work out so well, so start with what they need to know and give them some time to work with it. Save the fancy stuff for later once everyone is more comfortable with the basics.

There will inevitably be people who are excited about the potential the new product has – let them help to dictate when it’s time to introduce a new feature or process. Having an advocate on the team is great – it takes some pressure off you and it’s encouraging for the team to see a user like them who is excited about the product.

Axosoft Onboarding Tip: Outline your current process or what you want the new process to be. From there, configure your workflows to meet that basic process and then add in the advanced customization once people get the hang of the product.

Summary

Nobody likes change and implementing a new software solution takes some work. These are some of the best practices I have found, but there are lots more – sometimes you just need to step back and think about it for a minute.

Have you recently implemented a new solution (successfully or unsuccessfully)? What tips can you share?